Stay for a Second Chance

1

Drew walked past a wall of pipe fittings and plumber’s tape, wishing for the thousandth time that the Cypress Valley hardware store had a cash register at the lumber counter.

He hated having to go all the way to the front every time he came in—not because he minded the walk, but because of what was always waiting for him at the end of it.

“Hey, you!” Carley Fenton called from her place behind the old store’s single cashier stand. Her blinding smile grew wider as he approached, and Drew barely suppressed a groan.

And there it is.

“Mornin’, ma’am,” he mumbled. “Just this.” He held out his lumber ticket, and Carley took it with one hand. Then she giggled in an exaggerated sort of way.

“Now, Drew Tanner,” she cooed, “you don’t have to call me ma’am! We graduated the same year.”

So did a lot of people, he thought dryly, but he kept the words to himself. The less he said, the faster he could get back to work.

Carley glanced down at the slip of paper in her hand and began to type individual prices into her register. Drew was pretty sure the scanner near her hip would enter the entire ticket at once if she chose to use it, but she always insisted on doing his order one item at a time.

Heaven help him.

“Building again, huh?” she asked as she worked. “What is it this time?”

Drew reflexively tugged on the brim of his baseball cap, pulling the whole thing lower over his eyes. If there was one thing he hated, it was small talk. Well, that and Alabama football. “Chicken coop,” he answered curtly.

“First a shed, and now a chicken coop? Those muscles of yours stay busy, don’t they?” she asked, and Drew shifted his eyes to the wall of old-fashioned tools behind her head.

“There’s always work,” he answered.

Carley keyed in the final items on his ticket, and green lights appeared on the card reader near Drew’s left hand.

“Swipe when you’re ready,” she said, the words barely clearing her mouth before she barreled on.

“So, I’ve noticed you never seem to come down to Malone’s.

I’ll be there tonight, you know, if you want to try it out. ”

Drew slid his card through the reader and focused on the payment prompts as Carley’s voice droned on, saying something else about the local dive bar and a dance called “country swing,” whatever that was. He punched the last button and withdrew the card, which made the register spit out his receipt.

Finally!

He reached for the paper, but Carley snatched it first and folded it in half.

“I’ll tell you what,” she said, grabbing a ballpoint pen from a cup on the counter, “how ‘bout I put my number on this, and you can call me if you need a break from all the manual labor. All work and no play, you know . . .”

Drew stared, his jaw twitching in irritation as she scrawled a set of seven digits on the back of the receipt, followed by her name and a smiley face. Then she handed it over.

“Don’t lose it, okay?” she instructed. Her fingers slid deliberately over his as he took the slip, and something in Drew’s chest recoiled. He also hated unnecessary physical contact. Thankfully, the front door opened a few paces away, and the interruption saved him from saying something stupid.

“What’s taking so long in here?” his cousin Jonah asked, and a blast of late July heat followed him into the store.

Carley yanked her hand away from Drew’s and used it to tuck her hair behind one ear. “Sorry, Jonah! Y’all get everything tied down?”

“Yeah, no thanks to this one! I was starting to think he’d forgotten how to use a credit card,” Jonah replied, joking easily.

Drew glared out from beneath the bill of his hat. It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t made it out to help load the truck; in a perfect world, he’d have been done ten minutes ago.

Actually, in a perfect world, he’d have never left his house.

“Now I see why he got distracted,” Jonah went on with a wink. “I hope he’s remembered how to say more than three words at a time.”

Carley twittered, the way most girls did when faced with Jonah’s direct attention.

Drew all but rolled his eyes.

“Oh, Drew’s never been much of a talker,” she said with a giggle, “but that’s okay. You don’t have to talk to dance.”

Jonah flashed one of his trademark little-boy grins. “Dancing sounds fun! I’ll have to drag him out on the town sometime.”

Drew narrowed his eyes at his cousin, but Jonah kept going.

“Right now, though, I should probably get him home. He gets cranky when he hasn’t had his nap.” He met Drew’s gaze and nodded pointedly in Carley’s direction. “Say goodbye to the pretty girl.”

Drew glowered at him and flexed his jaw before remembering his manners. He might not like talking to people, but he wasn’t a Neanderthal. “G’bye, ma’am,” he said dutifully. “Thanks for your help.”

There. Six words. Merry Christmas.

“Any time, Drew!” she called back. “And please, call me Carley!”

Drew followed Jonah out the door, and he sucked in a breath as he stepped over the threshold and into the sweltering heat of a southern summer—one of the driest he could remember.

Dust coated the pavement beneath his boots and rose in tiny puffs with every step he took between the store and his truck.

He checked that the planks he’d purchased were securely tied onto the flatbed and raised his hand to the work crew that loitered in the shade just inside the lumberyard.

Then he yanked on the old Ford’s driver’s side door handle and climbed inside, cranking the ignition before turning the struggling AC on full blast. It wasn’t ice-cold like it would have been twenty years ago, but it was enough.

“Would it kill you to be sociable?” Jonah asked as he took his place at the opposite end of the bench seat.

Drew grunted in reply. No, it probably wouldn’t kill him, but he was too young to risk it.

“You know she was flirting with you, right?” Jonah went on.

Drew huffed out a breath and put the truck in reverse. “She was not,” he said darkly.

“Uh, yeah, she was. Hard.”

Drew reached out and turned up the volume on the radio—the universal sign that he didn’t want to talk—but Jonah immediately turned it back down.

“Look, I know you prefer your own company to anyone else’s, but you need to get out more. You’re never going to meet anyone if you’re always hiding in that cabin,” the younger man advised.

Drew turned on his blinker and made the left turn that would take him out of Cypress Valley and toward his family’s farm in nearby Copper Hill.

“What makes you think I want to meet anyone?” he grumbled.

“Because you’re human, despite your valiant efforts to become a bridge troll, and it’s not good for humans to be alone. That’s why God made more than one.”

“I have you. That’s plenty,” Drew retorted.

“Aww, thanks, but I’m not making out with you.”

“Who said anything about anybody making out with me?!”

“Trust me,” Jonah argued, “you need to be kissed well and often or else you get like . . . this.” He waved his hand as if encompassing Drew’s entire body from head to toe.

Drew bristled. “What does tha—”

Something darted across the road and disappeared from view. Drew slammed on the brakes and braced himself for the inevitable thump as whatever it was met its end beneath the tires. But the jolt didn’t come.

“What was that?” Jonah asked, turning to peer out the back window.

Drew kept his eyes on the pavement in front of them. “A fox, I think,” he said.

“Too big to be a fox,” Jonah countered.

“Alright, a coyote, then. Why does it matter? I didn’t hit it,” Drew protested.

“Pull over.”

“What? Why?”

“Just pull over,” Jonah repeated, already unbuckling his seat belt. “It might be hurt.”

Drew maneuvered over to the grassy shoulder of the road and turned on his hazard lights, scarcely believing he was obeying this ridiculous command.

Jonah shoved his door open and leapt to the ground the moment the truck stopped moving.

“It’s long gone now!” Drew objected loudly as his cousin began to walk back the way they had come.

“What exactly are you gonna do if you find it?”

Jonah didn’t answer. Drew looked in the rearview mirror and tracked the other man’s progress down the shoulder of the road. The idiot was clapping his hands and whistling.

Drew sighed and wiped one hand down his face. Then he reached for his door and pushed it open in one swift motion. He’d never forgive himself if he let his best friend and favorite cousin be mauled by a rabid animal right there on the side of Highway 14.

His boots hit the loose dirt on the side of the road, and he turned sharply, slamming his door behind him.

But he’d only gone a few paces down the white line before he spun on his heel and went back to retrieve a twelve-gauge shotgun from behind his seat.

Better safe than sorry. He trudged along the edge of the pavement, still watching the horizon for approaching traffic.

“This is stupid,” he grumbled to himself, but he kept walking anyway.

Finally, Jonah turned and waved one arm above his head. “Over here!” he called. “I found it!”

Picking up his pace, Drew jogged to where his cousin was now kneeling on the ground, carefully parting the slender branches of a bush growing near the fence. He peered over Jonah’s shoulder at a large mound of what initially looked like dirt . . . until he realized it was breathing.

“I think it’s a dog,” Jonah observed.

“A coyote is a dog,” Drew commented dryly.

“I mean a dog dog, you idiot! Like somebody’s dog.”

Drew looked closer, his gaze tracking along the creature’s thin neck and squarish head, where two dark eyes were indeed watching them.

It was a dog, though not the same kind they used on the farm.

A pit bull, maybe? All its limbs seemed straight enough, and there didn’t appear to be blood gushing from any orifice, so at least that was good.

He hadn’t crushed it with the truck after all.

The animal remained on its side and watched them warily, the only sound the harsh wheeze of its breathing—much faster than normal.